Vehicle body parts consist of formed sheet steel and/or are manufactured from aluminum. Sheet parts are formed to profiles and connected by welding, soldering, flanging (rolling) to other components. It is known in the case of aluminum to manufacture profile parts as extruded parts. Profile parts are used in particular in the area of bumpers, in which the forces are received and forwarded in provided directions.
The connecting of profile parts by welding is expensive and the expenditure of time for the welding process—independent of the welding method—depends on the connection length, i.e., the length of the welding seam. Also, the heat charge that takes place during the welding process during the shaping of the component must be considered.
Even connections by welding, hard welding, cause the cited disadvantages. Basically, the partial heat charge is less here but the solder required for the process must be added.
The use of solder-plated sheets in the construction of motor vehicles is known. For instance, heat exchangers are manufactured using such materials. A hard solder—usually AlSil2—is applied by a rolling process on a sheet in the case of a solder-plated sheet. An appropriately thin layer results from the rolling. The thin hard solder layer forms the connection layer, the carrier material and the sheet yields the required strength. The joining takes place by a furnace soldering, during which the solder is made available via the solder-plated aluminum sheets. The components are held by fixing elements in the position in which the connection is to take place. The furnace soldering takes place at approximately 590° C.